Formatting a USB drive is no different than formatting any other driveHow to Format a New Internal Hard Drive or Solid State DriveHow to Format a New Internal Hard Drive or Solid State DriveIf you have a new HDD or SSD, you should format it. Through formatting, you can wipe old data, malware, bloatware, and you can change the file system. Follow our step-by-step process.Read More. But how often have you actually formatted a drive and did you ever wonder what the various options mean?
Most of us go with the default settings without second-guessing their logic. Naturally, optimal settings depend on the type of hardware to be formatted and what you are planning to do with it.
How To Format A Usb Drive
This article will help you make the best choice. It explains what each option does and which one is best suited for your drive and expected use.
How to Format a USB Drive in Windows
Whether you’re running Windows XP, Windows 7, Windows 8.1, or Windows 10, the steps are essentially the same.
The formatting options you can customize are File system, Allocation unit size, Volume label, and Format options. You can also Restore device defaults in case your custom settings aren’t working.
To format your drive, you simply make your selection, click Start, followed by OK to confirm that you really want to erase all data and the drive will be formatted.
However, before you proceed with formatting, you will want to understand what each of these options actually means. So let’s go through them one by one.
Which File System to Choose?
In Windows 10, you will see a maximum of four different file systems: NTFS, FAT, FAT32, and exFATFAT32 vs. exFAT: What's the Difference and Which One Is Better?FAT32 vs. exFAT: What's the Difference and Which One Is Better?A file system is the tool that lets an operating system read data on any hard drive. Many systems use FAT32, but is that the right one, and is there a better option?Read More. You will actually not see FAT and FAT32 if your drive is larger than 32 GB. So what is the difference between those file systems and which one should you choose? Let’s look at the benefits of each.
NTFS Compared to FAT & FAT32:
FAT & FAT32 Compared to NTFS:
exFAT Compared to FAT & FAT32:
Due to its nature, FAT or better yet FAT32 are suitable for drives smaller than 32 GB and in an environment where you never need to store files larger than 2 or 4 GB, respectively. In other words, any regular sized hard drive (60 GB +) should be formatted with NTFS.
However, due to the way NTFS works it is not recommended for flash drives, even when they are bigger than 32 GB. This is where exFAT comes in. It unites the essential advantages of FAT (small, fast) and NTFS (large file size supported) in a way that is optimal for flash drives.
Keep in mind though that FAT and FAT32 are the only file systems that are cross-platform compatible. NTFS is supported by Linux, but it requires a hack or third party application to work on the Mac. exFAT, on the other hand, is supported as of OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard), but you need drivers to read it on Linux.
If for compatibility or speed reasons you want to go with FAT or FAT32, always go with FAT32, unless you are dealing with a device of 2 GB or smaller.
Which Allocation Unit Size Works Best?
Hard drives are organized in clusters and the allocation unit size describes the size of a single cluster. The file system records the state of each cluster, i.e. free or occupied. Once a file or a portion of a file is written to a cluster, the cluster is occupied, regardless of whether or not there is still space.
Hence, larger clusters can lead to more wasted or slack spaceHow to Recover Lost Space on a USB DriveHow to Recover Lost Space on a USB DriveIf your USB drive ever shrinks in capacity, there's a very simple solution you can use to restore all of that lost space.Read More. With smaller clusters, however, the drive becomes slower as each file is broken up into smaller pieces and it takes much longer to draw them all together when the file is accessed.
Thus the optimal allocation unit size depends on what you want to do with your USB drive. If you want to store large files on that drive, a large cluster size is better as the drive will be faster. If, however, you want to store small files or run programs off your flash drive, a smaller cluster size will help preserve space.
Rule of thumb: large drive and/or large files = large allocation unit size
For a 500 MB USB flash drive, rather select 512 bytes (FAT32) or 32 kilobytes (FAT). On a 1 TB external hard drive select 64 kilobytes (NTFS).
What Is a Volume Label?
The volume label simply is the name of the drive. It’s optional and you can basically name your drive anything you want. However, there are a few rules to follow, depending on the file system you’re going to format with.
NTFS:
FAT:
You can use spaces, regardless of the file system.
The question now is, how are you going to fill that freshly formatted USB drive? You should definitely own a USB repair toolkit! Don’t have enough sticks for all those ideas? These are the fastest USB flash drives5 of the Fastest and Best USB 3.0 Flash Drives5 of the Fastest and Best USB 3.0 Flash DrivesWhich are the fastest USB 3.0 flash drives you can buy? Here are five of the best, ranging from $20 to $200.Read More money can buy.
Lexar JumpDrive P20 32GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive - LJDP20-32GCRBNALexar JumpDrive P20 32GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive - LJDP20-32GCRBNA Buy Now On Amazon
Which Format Options Do We Recommend?
During a normal format, files are removed from the drive and the drive is scanned for bad sectors. During the Quick Format, only the files are removed and no scan is performed. Hence go with that option if you don’t have time and are dealing with a healthy or new drive.
If you found this article helpful, you might also want to know how to fix write protection errorsHow to Fix the Disk is Write Protected USB ErrorHow to Fix the Disk is Write Protected USB ErrorIs your USB drive throwing up a disk write protection error? In this article, we explain what that is and how you can fix it.Read More, how to reformat an external hard drive without losing data, or how to format a write-protected USB driveHow to Format a Write Protected USB Flash DriveHow to Format a Write Protected USB Flash DriveCame across a write protected flash drive? Here's how to format your write protected USB flash drive and start using it again.Read More.
What are your experiences with formatting USB drives and what are your preferred settings?
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Explore more about: Disk Partition, Tech Support, USB, USB Drive.
After having tooled around with a USB Linux version using your image overwritten or multi partitioned flash pen drive, you might find it necessary to revert it back to a single fat partition (restore the flash pen drive to its original state) that can again be read by all computers. Windows users can follow the Windows instructions below to Restore a Flash Drive using the HP USB Format Tool. For those working from Linux this task can easily be accomplished via the Linux Flash Drive Restoration tutorial that follows.
Restoring your USB key to its original state using Windows/Mac OS:
– Manual Method via Diskpart – Windows:
– Multiple GUI Methods – Windows:
Windows and or Mac OS users could use the SD Formatter Tool to reformat and restore a USB Drive.
Or alternately, Windows users could use BOOTICE
Restoring your USB key to its original state using Linux:
A. First we need to delete the old partitions that remain on the USB key.
B. Next we need to create the new partition.
C. The last step is to create the fat filesystem.
That's it, you should now have a restored USB key with a single fat 32 partition that can be read from any computer.
Similar Portable Linux Posts:
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Is it possible to format USB flash drive without losing data?
Like SD card, USB flash drive now is widely used by users to store personal files including pictures, videos files, documents, etc. But sometimes, USB drive can be get corrupted and become raw or inaccessible due to certain reason. Following this accident, USB not formatted error, USB not recognized or readable and some other problem occur. And the only way to fix the issue is to format the USB flash drive. But most people can not do it, as formatting will cost all their files on the device.
So, is it possible to format USB flash drive without losing data? Of course yes. In the last post, we have introduced you. Now, in this article, we would like to talk about how to format USB drive without losing data. Just read on to get the solution.
Does formatting USB erase data? How to save the USB data before formatting?
As we all know, formatting will erase all the data on a hard drive, USB or memory card. But in some special cases, you have to format your USB to repair corrupted or RAW USB, SD or external hard drive and fix some issue. Then finding a way to fix damaged USB flash drive without losing data become quite important.
Here, you are recommended to perform a fast data recovery to recover files from the flash drive before formatting it if you want to keep all your files. EaseUS file recovery software, a professional program which is helpful in all data loss cases, for example, recover files from flash drive not recognized, recover data from a raw drive, convert raw to NTFS or fat 32, etc can help you to do this job with ease. With its powerful data recovery capacity, it is the best solution for you to do format USB flash drive without losing data.
How to format USB flash drive without erasing/losing data?
You may follow below two guide tips and apply EaseUS file recovery software to format USB flash drive without erasing or losing data now:
Method 1. Recover data from a USB flash drive without formatting
Step 1. Connect your USB flash drive to your computer
Insert your USB flash drive into a USB port that is available to your desktop or laptop.
Launch EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard. See if the USB drive appears in the drive list. Click the 'Refresh disk' icon if the software did not detect any external storage device.
Step 2. Recover data from the formatted USB drive
Under 'External Devices', left-click on the USB drive and then click 'Scan'.
During the scan process, more and more data will appear in the scan results.
When the scan is over, please first check the results under 'Lost Partition Files'. Of course, check all the other scan results as well.
Preview the file quality via the view pane.
Select the wanted files and click 'Recover'.
Finishing all the above steps, to fully recover files from flash drive has been completed. And then you can try the Windows disk management tool to format USB flash drive without worrying about data loss problem. Now, just try it by yourself!
Method 2. Format USB flash drive without erasing or losing data
Now that you can directly format your USB flash drive without erasing saved data on your PC with simple clicks:
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After this, you can transfer restore data back to the USB drive and reuse USB flash drive to save and store data again.
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Applies To: Windows Server 2016 Essentials, Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials, Windows Server 2012 Essentials
You can create a bootable USB flash drive to use to deploy Windows Server Essentials. The first step is to prepare the USB flash drive by using DiskPart, which is a command-line utility. For information about DiskPart, see DiskPart Command-Line Options.
Tip
To create a bootable USB flash drive for use in recovering or reinstalling Windows on a PC instead of a server, see Create a recovery drive.
For additional scenarios in which you may want to create or use a bootable USB flash drive, see the following topics:
To create a bootable USB flash drive
See Also
Getting Started with the Windows Server Essentials ADK
Creating and Customizing the Image Additional Customizations Preparing the Image for Deployment Testing the Customer Experience
Getting Started with the Windows Server Essentials ADK
Creating and Customizing the Image Additional Customizations Preparing the Image for Deployment Testing the Customer Experience Comments are closed.
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